40:55B-10. Limitations on powers; appropriations; records and reports

No commission created under the authority of this chapter shall have any power of condemnation or eminent domain.

No commission created under the authority of this chapter shall have power to pledge the credit of the municipality by which it is created, or of any other municipality, or of the State of New Jersey, or to create any debt against or in any manner act as the agent of such municipality, or of the State of New Jersey.

Such commission shall have power and authority to make an economic survey, analyzing the present and potential possibilities of the municipality, with a view to ascertaining its industrial needs, determining its resources for efficient manufacture and exploring its probable sphere in the future development of the State and Nation. In carrying out such a survey, the commission shall study the needs of existing local industries so that means may be evolved to enable them to compete more successfully with competitors in other states; and more particularly how they might successfully round out and enlarge the products manufactured within the municipality with a view to diversifying local industry and stabilizing employment conditions. The commission may make any investigation deemed necessary to enable it effectually to carry out the provisions of this chapter and for that purpose the commission may take and hear proofs and testimony and compel the attendance of witnesses and the production of books, papers, records and documents, including public records, and its authorized agents may enter upon any lands as in its judgment may be necessary for the purpose of making surveys and examinations to accomplish any purpose authorized by this chapter.

Each commission shall make an annual report to the governing body of the municipality by which it has been created, setting forth in detail its operations and transactions for the preceding 12 months, and shall include therein its receipts and disbursements during that period. A copy of the report shall be filed in the office of the municipal clerk and be open to public inspection during the regular business hours of the clerk's office.

Nothing in this chapter provided and no authority given to or exercised by any commission created under this chapter shall impair or invalidate in any way any funded indebtedness of the municipality by which it has been created, nor impair the provisions of law regulating the payment into sinking funds of revenues derived from municipal property, or dedicating the revenues derived from any municipal property to a specific purpose.

The creation of a commission by a municipality shall not be deemed to limit in any manner the municipality's right to deal with its vacant lands, or to sell or lease the same, independently of such commission, as heretofore, but the powers conferred upon such commission, as heretofore, but the powers conferred upon such municipality and commission by this chapter shall be in addition to any rights or powers now possessed by such municipality with reference to its vacant lands or other properties.

The governing body of such municipality creating a commission under this chapter may appropriate annually, during the life of its commission, such sums as may be reasonably necessary to conduct the normal operations of the commission, but no moneys so appropriated shall be used by a commission for the construction of any building or to finance such construction. The commission shall annually present to the chief financial officer of the municipality its budget for operations for the ensuing year, reflecting therein all unexpended balances on hand from previous appropriations received from the municipality, at the same time and in the same manner and form as is required by several departments of the municipality's government, and the budget so submitted shall be acted upon as in the case of the budgets of such several municipal departments, and, being so acted upon, shall be made a part of the municipality's budget. A copy of the proposed budget shall be filed in the commission's office and be open to public inspection during the regular business hours of the commission's office. Each commission shall keep and maintain at its office complete and accurate records of its accounts, and separate accounts shall be kept for its normal functions which shall be open to public inspection during the regular business hours of the commission's office. No commission shall exceed its budget, and moneys received from the municipality by which it has been created shall be expended only for the purposes for which they have been appropriated.

Amended by L.1977, c. 195, s. 1, eff. Aug. 29, 1977; L.1984, c. 196, s. 3, eff. Nov. 27, 1984.